Maggie’s Land

Chapter 1

“Almost home Sadie.” Maggie muttered as she grabbed hold of the reins. The horse plodded along knowing the way by heart. It’s been a long wet day getting provisions in Aberdeen. “No girl not the barn - got to unload the house stuff first.” Maggie stopped the wagon near the front door and sat for a minute and looked at the house. “God I hate this place. If it wasn’t for the fact that I hate Marco more I would sell to him it a minute.” Grabbing a load of fresh fruit she heads for the door. Fumbling it open she steps into the kitchen and sets the box on the table—or tries to. There is a man in a brown coat bleeding in her way. Maggie drops the box and reaches for a towel to stanch the flow of blood - then she hears a gun cock behind her. As she turns, one of the largest men she has ever seen is holding a gun on her. He tells her to stop and drop the towel. She looks him in the eyes and sees anger and fear. “If you were going to shoot me I’d be dead by now!” and pressed the towel to the wound in the man’s shoulder “Looks like it went clean thru. Care to tell me who you are and why you’re in my kitchen?” The wounded man regains consciousness “Jayne! put the gun down, Sorry about the mess Ma’am —needed to get in out of the rain. My name is Malcolm Reynolds and this here is Jayne. Had a bit of trouble in Hoquiam. Thought it best if we left town for a while.” Reynolds struggled to a sitting position “Don’t want any trouble, just waiting for the Feds to move on so we can get back to town.” “What kind of trouble you have with the Alliance ?” Maggie continued to clean the wound. Jayne watched Maggie closely, not only so she couldn’t do any harm to the Captain, but because he just liked watching her. Liked a women who didn’t scare easy. He kind of wondered where the rest of the household was “You live in this big ol’ house alone?” Jayne figured she did, as he saw no signs of men folk around. “I’ve lived alone since my husband died. What kind of trouble did you say you were having?” She asked again, while helping Mr. Reynolds roll onto his back. “Didn’t say.” Jayne snorts as he starts looking thru the fruit on the floor. “Not our food Jayne, put it back.” Mal says sitting up. “If I feed you will you tell me what’s going on?” Maggie asks as she helps Jayne gather up the fruit. Maggie looks at Jayne, as he looks hopefully at Mal, as he reluctantly nods his head. “Help me unload the rest of the wagon and I’ll cook while you talk.” Unloading goes quickly and Sadie is soon safe in the barn. Maggie starts to cook up a dinner of biscuits, steak and eggs. Meanwhile Mal goes into some details about the botched up job in Hoquiam. Something about stealing from the Alliance and a double cross by someone called Badger. Maggie was only half listening. She hadn’t been this content in a long time. Had not realized how lonely she was out here. The men both ate as if they had not had real food in a long time. The one called Mal stopped after two helpings, the other one ate like he would never stop until Mal gave him a look and said not to eat her out of house and home. Maggie had cleaned up as the men ate and was wondering what was going to happen next. Jayne jumped up as the little box in Mal’s pocket beeped. “Some one’s coming.” He said as he ran to the door. “How long till they get here?” asked Mal. “We got ten to fifteen minutes depending on if they’re riding straight here.” “Well thanks for your hospitality, but we gotta get going.” Mal said as he tried to stand and stumbled in to Jayne. “Not sure you’re going anywhere Mal. This is as good a place as any to make a stand.” Jayne stated as he started to bring weapons out of every conceivable place. “I did some recon earlier while you were out and this place is built real sturdy.” “We are not having a gunfight in this nice lady’s house Jayne. Put your stuff back and lets go.” “I agree with Jayne - you’re not going anywhere Mr. Reynolds. You said you were stealing from the Alliance, then you came to the right house. I have no love for the Alliance - they killed my parents because they thought they were smuggling guns for the Independents.” Maggie was removing a wall from behind the stove as she said this “Just because they were right is no reason for me not to hate them. Not much room in there, built for guns not men.” Mal and Jayne both looked at the small coffin size hole in the wall. “I ain’t hiding from the Alliance!” Mal yells and turns to Jayne “I told you to pack up your stuff so we can get.” Jayne looks at Mal as he sways back and forth “Mal you ain’t going no where the shape your in and you hide from the Alliance all the time.” Mal gives Jayne a look that says I don’t care if you are right, don’t you ever correct me. Aloud he says “We ain’t both going to fit in that box.” Maggie has been gathering towels to put in the hole and has missed out on most of the argument. She makes a sort of nest and tries to help Mal into the wall. He just glares at her and she lets go. “Look, I have no love for the Alliance but I’ll be dammed if I’m going to have them shoot up my house because you are to stubborn to hide in that wall.” With that she glares back at him until he climbs into the wall. “But what about Jayne? No way he is getting in here with me.” “Don’t worry about Jayne I have some where else for him.” “Jayne you go with her and no problems, you do what she says. You understand me?” Mal glares at Jayne until he nods in acceptance. With that Maggie closes up the wall and grabs Jayne's hand. “You got another hidey hole big enough for me?” “No, you’re to big for any hole in the wall.” Maggie said as she drags him up the stairs. Glad that she made him take off his boots, she runs into the bedroom and starts digging around in her jewelry box. Jayne just looks around and takes in everything. “Where you going to hide me up here? I ain’t going to fit under the bed. Sides that’s the first place they'll look. We ain’t got much time here girl.” Finally Maggie finds what she is looking for and turns to Jayne. “Here put this on and get into bed.” Maggie hands Jayne a gold ring. “The only place to hide you is in plain sight and the only way to explain you in my house is as my husband.” Jayne looks at the ring and back at Maggie. “Well as much as I like the idea of getting into your bed, ain’t no way I’m getting married to do it.” “Don’t be a fool, it’s just a ring, doesn’t mean anything and you may be getting into my bed but that’s as far as it goes.” Maggie pushes Jayne towards the bed. Well, she tried to push him, he just stares at her and watched as she starts to unbutton her dress. “Get down to your skivvies and get into bed. You’re the one that said we don’t have much time!” Jayne just continued to watch and as she hit him on the shoulder he came out of his daze and replied sheepishly “I ain’t wearing any skivvies.” Maggie, down to just her slip now, looked at Jayne “Of course you’re not. Just strip and get into bed.” Maggie walked over to the door and closes it and turned off the light. Jayne took advantage of this and slipped off his pants and slid naked into bed, except for the two knifes and a gun he tucked around the bed. No need to be caught completely unarmed. Jayne thought back to what Mal had said and knew he better behave himself if he wanted to get back on his good side, but that might be harder than he thought as Maggie slides into the bed next to him. Don’t think I ever smelled anything quite like her. Not sexy and foo-fooy like Inara or musky and sweaty like Zoë. Not even little Kaylee smells this nice. Maggie is clean and fresh, even after a long day she still smells good. Maggie can not believe she is doing this. This man, the way he looks at her, it’s kind of scary. She heard part of what the Captain told him and she’s glad. This man could break her in two and do what every he wanted. I hope he is loyal to his Captain or I’m in a world of trouble. Jayne is trying to stay as far away from Maggie as he can and still be in the same bed. He can’t remember every being in a bed with someone that looked this good and wasn’t a whore. Maggie looks at Jayne and appreciates that he is trying not to touch her, must really be afraid of his captain. “There is no way anyone is going to believe that we are married if you are on the other side of the bed like that. Move over here.” she grabs him and tries to pull him towards her. Again he is an immoveable object and Maggie ends up sliding towards him. “Oh God, where are the Feds when you need them.” Jayne thinks to himself and scoots back a few inches. Out loud he says “When we hear someone I’ll move over. Not ‘til then.” Maggie thinks to herself, this is the first man I have had in my bed in four years and he is to scared to even touch me. I can’t believe I want him to touch me. Where the hell are those Feds? Thinking he hears footsteps on the front porch. Jayne tenses up and pulls Maggie closer. He is on his side facing the door with Maggie facing him. Maggie looks up at him and thinks if this is going to work we can not just be laying here watching the door. She reaches up and caress his face and he finally looks down at her. Slowly she moves up and kisses him. What the hell is she doing, I don’t kiss on the mouth. But instead of pulling away as his first instinct told him to, he slowly realizes that he likes this. Kissing her was nothing like kissing whores. This was sweet and soft and slowly he released the tension he had been holding. When they finally broke for air Jayne looked at her to be sure she was OK with this. The look on her face spurred him on and slowly he began to run his right hand down along her side, while exploring her neck with his mouth. God she taste good, how can anyone taste that good. Maggie could not believe what was happening. This was what it was suppose to be like. Neither of her husbands had every kissed her like this. She could not believe how good this felt and she brought her hand back up to caress his face. Jayne went back to devouring her mouth and was so involved he didn’t hear the door open. Next thing he knew he was grabbed from behind and tossed off the bed. When he looked up he saw four Feds with guns aimed at him and a skinny guy yelling at them to shoot the bastard for raping his fiancé. Maggie screamed “Stop it Marco! he’s my husband.”